Arts Integration and Van Gogh!

         I teach at a school that focuses heavily on Arts Integration so I will be devoting a lot of my posts to this subject. I think it is so powerful to teach with the whole body engaged. I will share how I use Music, Drama, Dance and Visual Arts in a first grade classroom. I hope I can inspire someone without training to try some of the strategies!They work!
         In February, I work on Poetry throughout the month and use paintings along with Visual Thinking Strategies ( basically observation skills) to develop descriptive writing using sensory images. We use Starry Night by Van Gogh for our first senses poem. We brainstorm phrases using our senses and the students write as descriptively as they can using a template with I see..., I hear..., I taste... I smell..., and I feel.

Here's an example of a Starry Night senses poem I typed up for the student and put in her poetry book for the end of the year: See how she used a metaphor for the stars! :)








After we write the poem, we create our own Starry Night scenes using a crayon resist method with watercolor. We also create a city scene in the foreground.

Tomorrow, I'm going to post the next painting we use for a senses poem and then show you how we make a pop art piece depicting our favorite food. After we create our artwork we write an opinion piece using a multi-flow map for organization.

  If this interests you at all, consider following me! :)

Erin